SCENE iv PART SiKJUJN D 299
stream some of the French forces are visible. Away behind these stretches
a great wood several miles in area, out of which the Albuera stream emerges,
and behind the furthest verge of the wood the morning sky lightens momently.
The birds in the wood, unaware that this day is to be different from even-
other day they have known there, are heard singing their overtures with their
usual serenity.
DUMB SHOW
As objects grow more distinct it can be perceived that some strategic
dispositions of the night are being completed by the French forces, v.hich the
evening before lay in the woodland to the front of the English army. They
have emerged during the darkness, and large sections of them—Infantry,
cuirassiers, and artillery—have crept round to BERESFORD'S right without his
suspecting the movement, where they lie hidden by the great hill aforesaid,
though not more than half-a-mile from his right wing.
SPIRIT OF THE YEARS
A hot ado goes forward here to-day',
If I may read the Immanent Intent
From signs and tokens blent
With weird unrest along- the firmament
Of causal coils in passionate display.
—Look narrowly\ and what you witness say.
SPIRIT OF THE PITIES
/ see red -smears upon the sickly dawn,
And seeming drops of gore. On earth below
Are men—unnatured and mechanic-drawn—
Mixt nationalities in row and raw^
Wheeling tfiem to and fro
In moves dissociate from their souls' demand,
For dynasts' ends that few even understand!
SPIRIT OF THE YEARS
Speak more materially^ and less in dream.
SPIRIT OF RUMOUR
/'// do it. . . . The stir of strife grows 'well defined
Around the hamlet and the church thereby :
Till) from the wood, the ponderous columns wind.
Guided by Godinot^ with Werle nigh.
They bear upon the mil. But the gruff guns
Of Dicksoris Portuguese
Punch spectral vistas through the maze of these ! . . .
More Frenchmen press, and roaring antiphons
Of cannonry contuse the roofs and 'walls and trees, x